


Meditation

by alicekittridge



Series: Forms and Faces [2]
Category: The Favourite (2018)
Genre: F/F, Mild Angst, POV Third Person, Present Tense, Sexual Content
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-25
Updated: 2020-03-25
Packaged: 2021-03-01 03:21:12
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,421
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23308261
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alicekittridge/pseuds/alicekittridge
Summary: She’ll sink to her knees for Anne, but it is not the kind of sinking one does when they are in love; that sinking means pledging oneself to the other, until death do they part. She believes, suddenly, that she has never felt that kind of love in her life.
Relationships: Abigail Hill Masham/Anne Stuart Queen of the United Kingdom
Series: Forms and Faces [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1676203
Kudos: 14





	Meditation

**Author's Note:**

> I listened to the Anna Karenina soundtrack for this one. Dario Marianelli is a genius...

**T** HE DOOR SHUTS behind Mr. Harley, and Abigail throws the book to the side, giving up the façade entirely. It’d held her interest as soon as she’d opened it, and then, too suddenly, it vanished. Not only due to Harley’s presence. His questions have left her troubled. She watches the red-coated guardsman venture down the graveled walkway, Greek-looking with the lighted torch in hand; remembers that same path leads to the gardens where, hours before slipping the poison into Sarah’s tea, she’d shot at pheasants and splattered her cousin’s face with the poor creature’s blood. Afterward, in a fit of madness, Sarah had left for riding and did not return. The poisoned tea had done its work. Abigail ponders where she could’ve ended up; it was enough poison to make one sick and sleep, not to kill them; but surely Sarah was stumbling about the woods, raggedy as a bog-witch, walking unsteadily in the direction home.

Abigail had done it out of jealousy, so that Anne’s attention would, for once, be wholly on her always and not only for a night, while being fucked, with Abigail asking while stroking her cunt, “Are you thinking of her?” The plan had worked for only a little while. Anne’s anger was directed at the absent Sarah, feeling the part of a woman scorned, until the disappearance lasted for longer than two days and the concern, along with her ailment, troubled Anne at night. Even far away, Sarah was a spectre whose presence was a heavy weight in the room.

There will be a call for her any moment. To supper or to bed, Abigail knows not; she only knows the feelings harboring within her will grow more muddled in Anne’s presence. It is, she thinks, rising to light the white candles about her room, best to sort them out now, while the hours are quiet. She channels a phantom Harley, has him sit and smoke in the chair he’d occupied, and ask, once again, “Are you in love with the Queen, Abigail?”

“Love has many forms, Mr. Harley,” she says aloud. “I have said this once, already.”

“To be _in love_ with somebody is entirely different than simply _loving_ them.”

“Then the answer I give is this: I do not know.” She lights the last candle, the one on the nightstand, winces when the flame licks her finger. One can only feel so many emotions at once, and to try to discern between them is a complicated task. She cares for Anne, like a good servant ought to, and like a friend, but feels a stirring for her like a lustful man, or one who has been struck by beauty and knows not what to do with it. She wants to harness it, wrap it around her fingers so that she may hold it and cherish it and kiss it. She’ll sink to her knees for Anne, but it is not the kind of sinking one does when they are in love; that sinking means pledging oneself to the other, until death do they part. She believes, suddenly, that she has never felt that kind of love in her life.

Two knocks sound the footman’s presence. By now, he knows to say absolutely nothing, that his mere appearance means Anne has sent for her. Quickly, Abigail fixes herself up, takes up a mounted candle, and walks with the footman—whose name, she now remembers, is George—to the intricate door of Anne’s chamber. He lets her in and then turns back to stand, statue still, at guard.

At the far side of the room, a fire glows orange in the grate, slowly dying. Only a few golden candles are lit to compliment it. A shroud of shadow surrounds Anne’s bed, hiding the figure within. Abigail reawakens the fire until it burns as steadily as the torches outside. Then, carefully, she parts the curtains, revealing Anne, wide awake from an obviously troubled sleep, her hair looking as nest-like as ever.

“What ails you?” asks Abigail carefully.

“I’ve woken from the wickedest dreams,” Anne replies. Her voice is laden with tiredness and worry, and despite the chill creeping into the room with the new darkness, sweat glistens in the line of her hair. “I dreamt Sarah was torn apart by branches.”

“They are only dreams.”

Anne nods, a child reassured but remaining uncertain if dreams are what they are or a sort of prophecy. Her attention turns to the caged rabbits. “Let the children out, will you?” she asks.

“Now?”

“Yes, dear one, now; freedom tastes the same no matter the time of day.”

The rabbits scamper about the floor once let loose. Hildebrand, a gentle-souled black one, mingles below the window, his shaking nose rising to it. Anne smiles at the sight of him. The other sixteen spread away from him, exploring the sofas and the dressers and the vanity, snuffling at the floors in search of supper.

“Precious creatures,” Anne says.

“Truly.”

“But I must ask, are you very fond of rabbits?”

“They are your children,” replies Abigail. “Of course I am fond of them.” She adds, when she notes that Anne isn’t fully satisfied with the answer, “I am fond of all God’s creatures, your highness; even the vermin.”

“The mice and the rats and the roaches?”

“If fondness includes a quick death.”

Anne’s smile grows a little wider. “How bleak you are!” Together they watch Beatrice, a copper rabbit, hop around the bed, until at last Anne shifts and says, “I’m afraid I must be dressed for supper.” Abigail takes her offered hand and helps her down from the tall bed as if helping her down from a carriage. She leads Anne to the vanity, where she sinks heavily upon the chair with a sigh and gazes out the window while Abigail selects a decent outfit. It is spring; she figures a bright color ought to do, something to lift Anne’s spirits a little. She settles on a white dress with spring green edges and holds it up for Anne’s approval.

“I often forget I have that one,” Anne comments, and gestures for her to step over with it.

“It’ll look lovely on you,” Abigail says, draping the dress over the back of the vanity’s chair and helping Anne from her salty-smelling nightclothes. Underneath, her naked skin is pale, save her legs, which, this evening, are a lighter shade of red. She bends so that Anne can step into the dress, but pauses. Anne is studying her reflection in the small, gold-backed mirror, her face a combination of sad and serious.

“I loathe growing old,” she says. “It turns people into hideous things.”

“Hideous is a word not at all associated with you.”

She feels her body. “Look at me.” Abigail stares into the same mirror. “Am I not like a sagging sack of flour?”

Abigail cannot imagine Anne in her younger years, but she thinks she would have looked much the same, if a bit perkier in places. Still desirable. Still wonderful. She says, “It is the path we all must take. In a few decades, it will be me in your place,” she trails a finger over a bare shoulder, “and my own maid will be telling me the same as what I am telling you.” The hand travels lower, joining Anne’s near her right breast. “Don’t you agree?”

“Yes,” Anne says after a moment. 

“But if you liken yourself to a sagging sack of flour,” she cups Anne’s breast, strokes her nipple into hardness, “then you are a very desirable one.” She buries her face against Anne’s shoulder, presses a kiss to the skin there, and is surprised when Anne moves her hand to between her legs and pushes it against her. Abigail suppresses a laugh and, with gentle earnest, fucks her against the vanity. It isn’t the usual way things have gone, but, she supposes, if Anne desires a fuck before supper, then she shall get one. She shall get anything she wants as long as it is Abigail to give it to her.

Anne curses at her crisis and trembles as she’s brought down from it. Abigail would sink to her knees and put her tongue inside her if there was time for such a thing. She pulls out and away, licks the salt noisily from her fingers before wiping them on her own nightclothes. She allows Anne to breathe for only a moment before telling her, “Let us dress you. I’ve already made you late.”


End file.
